Women today spend more time outside the home then they ever have in the past. Careers, children, social activities, part-time jobs and other interests keep women outside the home a majority of the time. Since women spend most of their time outside their home they need to be able to conveniently and discreetly carry any and all of their personal feminine necessities, especially such items needed for their menstrual cycle. Women menstruate for approximately one week out of every month. Thus, they need to have, at their disposal, items needed during menstruation.
Tampons, pills, and feminine napkins are the most popularly used items during menstruation. Given that they are likely to be out of the home, when women need to carry pills, such as MIDOL.RTM. or any other standard menstrual cycle pill either prescription or over-the-counter, they need to carry the dispenser that the pills come in when they were purchased. These dispensers carry anywhere from 15-100 pills. They are awkward and noisy. Such pill dispensers are made to be kept in a medicine cabinet and not to be carried around constantly in the bottom of a women's purse or briefcase Tumbling around in a bottom of a purse, the pills usually end up chipping or breaking into pieces. Even worse, the dispensers themselves break or open, thus, spilling and contaminating the pills. Even if the dispensers do not break or spill open, it is still awkward and noisy to carry pills in such dispensers. There is nothing discreet about pills hammering against the sides of a pill dispenser constantly.
There are smaller sized containers available to hold a smaller number of pills. These containers are made of aluminum or tin rectangular pieces and house approximately 8-12 pills. The containers are supplied by the manufacturers of the particular pills and include the manufacturers' logo on them. Such containers are very small, only of the size to house the pills themselves, and are easily lost in the bottom of a woman's purse. Furthermore, they do not have secure sealing mechanisms. The sealing mechanisms usually consists of pressure points on the top back corners for flipping open the top front. This awkward sealing mechanism is neither secure nor convenient. It is either very difficult to open such containers or the containers open too quickly and the contents are spilt.
Moreover, women today are forced to carry around tampons because most of the public restrooms lack facilities to provide such items. To carry around tampons for use during the day, women have to carry them in their purse or briefcase. Purses or briefcases generally do not have separate compartments sized to carry around tampons. In a purse or briefcase, the tampons are not well concealed. They are revealed whenever the purse or briefcase is opened. This can often be a very embarrassing situation for women at work or at public places.
Furthermore, since the tampons are usually only protected by a flimsy covering of tissue or thin plastic, they do not last long in the bottom of a cluttered purse. Most purses are filled with all types of objects The covers usually rip off the tampons before they ever get to be used. This is bad both financially and hygienically. If a ripped cover goes undetected, an unsuspecting user could contract any number of possible diseases or infections.
Another alternative is to carry the tampons around separately and in poorly designed cases, meant for usually anything but tampons. Some tampon manufacturers do provide a casing for carrying tampons in a purse or briefcase but they are not suitable casings. They are not discreet. They are shaped like tampons and some even have the tampon manufacturer's logo on them. Moreover, the containers provided by the manufacturers open and close with a friction fit. The friction fit is not suitable for staying closed in a cluttered purse or briefcase. Therefore, the containers usually open and spill the contents
Moreover, there have been no structure provided that has separate compartments for both pills and tampons. The prior art includes multi-compartment containers that have multiple compartments contained in one structure. However, most of the compartments of a single container are of uniform size. The containers can only be used for storing items of equal size. In fact, most of the prior art devices are dedicated pill dispensers.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,793,492 (Halkich) is a home care pill box that contains a plurality of compartments for pills, arranged, indexed and differentiated in units for use over a selected period of time. In other words, the box has a line of seven compartments sized to hold pills. The box is attachable to an identical box also consisting of seven identical compartments
U.S. Pat. No. 3,061,136 (Sterngart) discloses a container with a central horizontal partition with chambers for an upper and lower compartment of identical size. The same sized containers are attachable to form multiple compartments of the same size. These compartments are the identical size to store many small articles such as paper clips, stamps, sewing items, etc.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,817,808 (Bracy) discloses a receptacle for storing preparing food items. The disclosure includes eight compartments of the same size with individual lids for accessing the contents in such compartments. The invention also includes six separate compartments of different sizes but all were accessible only by a common cover opening. Thus, if the cover is opened the contents of all six compartments are revealed.
The prior art does not address the need for a multi-compartment container with multiple sized compartments with lids that do not reveal the contents of other compartments. Women today have a need to be able to discreetly, yet conveniently carry around items of a personal nature. A multi-compartment container that can hygienically and discreetly hold feminine products, as well as related medication, is needed in the market. So far, only pill dispensers and containers with the same size compartments or containers with various sized compartments but having common covers that reveal the contents of more than one compartment are available.
Thus, among the common disadvantages of the prior art is the lack of ability to store items of different sizes. Moreover, there is no convenient and compact device to carry different sized personal and private items.